When we have said of Donna Prassede that she was dead, we have said all; but Don Ferrante, considering that he was a man of erudition, is deemed by our anonymous author worthy of more extended mention; and we, at our own risk, will transcribe, as nearly as possible, what he has left on record about him.

He says, then, that, on the very first whisper of pestilence, Don Ferrante was one of the most resolute, and ever afterwards one of the most persevering, in denying it, not indeed with loud clamours, like the people, but with arguments, of which, at least, no one could complain that they wanted concatenation.

`In rerum natura,` he used to say, `there are but two species of things, substances and accidents; and if I prove that the contagion cannot be either one or the other, I shall have proved that it does not exist – that it is a mere chimera. Here I am, then. Substances are either spiritual or material. That the contagion is a spiritual substance, is an absurdity no one would venture to maintain; it is needless, therefore, to speak of it. Material substances are either simple or compound. Now, the contagion is not a simple substance; and this may be shown in a few words. It is not an ethereal substance; because, if it were, instead of passing from one body to another, it would fly off as quickly as possible to its own sphere. It is not aqueous: because it would wet things, and be dried up by the wind. It is not igneous; because it would burn. It is not earthy; because it would be visible. Neither is it a compound substance; because it must by all means be sensible to the sight and the touch; and who has seen this contagion? who has touched it? It remains to be seen whether it can be an accident. Worse and worse. These gentlemen, the doctors, say that it is communicated from one body to another; for this is their Achilles, this the pretext for issuing so many useless orders. Now, supposing it an accident, it comes to this, that it must be a transitive accident, two words quite at variance with each other; there being no plainer and more established fact in the whole of philosophy than this, that an accident cannot pass from one subject to another. For if, to avoid this Scylla, we shelter ourselves under the assertion that it is an accident produced, we fly from Scylla and run upon Charybdis: because, if it be produced, then it is not communicated, it is not propagated, as people go about affirming. These principles being laid down, what use is it to come talking to us so about weals, pustules, and carbuncles? . . .`
`All absurdities,` once escaped from somebody or other.
`No, no,` resumed Don Ferrante, `I don`t say so: science is science; only we must know how to employ it. Weals, pustules, carbuncles, parotides, violaceous tumours, black swellings, are all respectable words, which have their true and legitimate signification: but I say that they don`t affect the question at all. Who denies that there may be such things, nay, that there actually are such? All depends upon seeing where they come from.`
Here began the woes even of Don Ferrante. So long as he confined himself to declaiming against the opinion of a pestilence, he found everywhere willing, obliging, and respectful listeners; for it cannot be expressed how much authority the opinion of a learned man by profession carries with it, while he is attempting to prove to others things of which they are already convinced. But when he came to distinguish, and to try and demonstrate that the error of these physicians did not consist in affirming that there was a terrible and prevalent malady, but in assigning its rules and causes; then (I am speaking of the earliest times, when no one would listen to a word about pestilence), then, instead of listeners, he found rebellious and intractable opponents; then there was no room for speechifying, and he could no longer put forth his doctrines but by scraps and piecemeal.

`There`s the true reason only too plainly, after all,` said he; `and even they are compelled to acknowledge it, who maintain that other empty proposition besides . . . Let them deny, if they can, that fatal conjunction of Saturn with Jupiter. And when was it ever heard say that influences may be propagated . . . And would these gentlemen deny the existence of influences? Will they deny that there are stars, or tell me that they are placed up there for no purpose, like so many pin – heads stuck into a pin – cushion? . . . But what I cannot understand about these doctors is this; to confess that we are under so malignant a conjunction, and then to come and tell us, with eager face, `Don`t touch this, and don`t touch that, and you`ll be safe!` As if this avoiding of material contact with terrestrial bodies could hinder the virtual effect of celestial ones! And such anxiety about burning old clothes! Poor people! will you burn Jupiter, will you burn Saturn?`

His fretus, that is to say, on these grounds, he used no precautions against the pestilence; took it, went to bed, and went to die, like one of Metastasio`s heroes, quarrelling with the stars.

And that famous library of his? Perhaps it is still there, distributed around his walls.